Spotlight: Supreme King Dragon Darkwurm

There's an astonishing number players who initially slept on this card -
myself included – who are now finally getting around to figuring out ways
to abuse it. TCGplayer alum and all-around incredible innovator Bobby Kenny
showed me what Darkwurm was capable of back in late May, and with the
changes to Pendulums through Link rules and a set of new Supreme King
monsters, I think now is the best time to take a closer look at what
Darkwurm has to offer.

Supreme King Dragon Darkwurm excels in an area Pendulums have lacked for a
long time: Xyz Summoning. Synchro, Fusion, and Link Summoning with
Pendulums sends the materials to the Extra Deck where they can be Pendulum
Summoned later, but Xyz Summons end up putting Pendulums in the graveyard.
When your resource pool is the Extra Deck you don't want your
monsters to end up in the graveyard. And yet, Darkwurm doesn't care. It can
return from either location provided you have a Pendulum Scale or no
monsters on your field.

Pendulum Effect : Once per turn, if you control no monsters: You can place 1 "Supreme King Gate" Pendulum Monster from your Deck in your Pendulum Zone, also you cannot Pendulum Summon monsters for the rest of this turn, except DARK monsters.
Monster Effect : If this card is Normal or Special Summoned: You can add 1 "Supreme King Gate" Pendulum Monster from your Deck to your hand. If this card is in your Graveyard and you control no monsters: You can Special Summon this card. You can only use each monster effect of "Supreme King Dragon Darkwurm" once per turn.

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At Level 4 Darkwurm's utility for Xyz Summons is incredible. It won't help
you get to Timestar Magician, unfortunately, but it's worth putting into a
Master Paladin, the Ascending Dracoslayer. In non-Pendulum strategies where
you're constantly sending cards to the graveyard – such as Lightsworns –
you can run Darkwurm as a free Special Summon from the graveyard. (Though
it does tend to be outclassed by Fairy Tail - Snow, in that narrow
context.)

Extra monsters are extremely valuable as Link Materials for hard-to-Summon
Link-3's. Missus Radiant is currently the closest thing to a generic Link-2
with downward-pointing arrows, so putting Link-3's on the board is
incredibly important for branching out and putting multiple Extra Deck
monsters on the field. Pendulums especially want more zones to Pendulum
Summon to from the Extra Deck, so any card that gets them one step closer
to a Decode Talker is well worth checking out.

What's better than one free monster? How about two? When Darkwurm's Normal
or Special Summoned its effect lets you add a Supreme King Gate Infinity or
Supreme King Gate Zero from your deck to your hand. You can activate both
of Darkwurm's effects once per turn, so Special Summoning it from the
graveyard's effectively a +2 if you play a Supreme King Gate. Darkwurm's
Pendulum effect is a +1 that places a Supreme King Gate Pendulum Monster in
your Pendulum Zone when you control no monsters. You can only Pendulum
Summon Dark monsters for the rest of the turn, but Darkwurm's essentially a
one-card Pendulum Scale.

Both of the Supreme King Gate Pendulum Monsters have interesting effects
and unique Pendulum Scales. They're definitely worth a look.

Gateway To The Extra Deck
The Supreme King Gate Pendulum Monsters feature somewhat-generic 13 and 0
Scales. Supreme King Gate Infinity's the only Scale 13 in the game, and
Supreme King Gate Zero is one of only two 0 Scale monsters. With both cards
in your Pendulum Zones you can essentially disregard the Level condition
attached to the Pendulum mechanic. Infinity's by far the most consistent
way to Pendulum Summon Level 12's, but there are only two monsters that
this applies to: Subterror Behemoth Ultramafus and Flower Cardian
Paulownia.

Regardless, having access to one high-end and one low-end Pendulum Scale
through Supreme King Dragon Darkwurm's effect is very useful. You can
search out whichever Scale you need at that moment. Supreme King Gate Zero
has no restrictions, but Infinity won't let you Pendulum Summon if you
control a monster. That's a problem since you'll likely be searching it out
after Summoning Darkwurm. You'll need to clear your field before you can
use Infinity for a Pendulum Summon.

Pendulum Effect : If you control "Supreme King Z-ARC", you take no damage. Once per turn, if you have "Supreme King Gate Infinity" in your other Pendulum Zone: You can destroy both cards in your Pendulum Zones, and if you do, add 1 "Polymerization" Spell Card or "Fusion" Spell Card from your Deck to your hand.
Monster Effect : Once per turn: You can target 1 other face-up card you control; destroy both it and this card, and if you do, Special Summon 1 Dragon-Type Fusion or Synchro Monster from your Extra Deck, but its ATK and DEF become 0, it has its effects negated, also it cannot be used as a Material for a Synchro or Xyz Summon. If this card in the Monster Zone is destroyed by battle or card effect: You can place this card in your Pendulum Zone.

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You can also trade Zero and Infinity for a Polymerization or Fusion Spell
Card from your deck. That's handy for searching out a Brilliant Fusion or
Instant Fusion, but it's not something that comes up terribly often unless
you specifically build around that combo. Since Link rules arrived there's
less reason to load up your Extra Deck with monsters, so I'm not sure that
combo holds up anymore.

Pairing Supreme King Gate Zero with Darkwurm is likely the best way to play
the Supreme King engine. Gate Zero has a 0 Scale that pairs perfectly with
Darkwurm in Level 4-heavy Pendulum strategies. Adding Gate Zero is the
easiest of the two Supreme King Gates to play, and its final monster effect
helps can be fairly useful too. Lastly, you're more likely to Pendulum
Summon a Level 1 monster than a Level 12, so a Scale 0 will naturally have
higher utility than a Scale 13.

Darkwurm In Pendulum MagiciansSupreme King Dragon Darkwurm is at its best when there are ample discard
outlets available, lots of other Dark Pendulum monsters, few Normal
Summons, and opportunities to use at least Supreme King Gate Zero
effectively. Pendulum Magicians meet these requirements, but that's no
surprise to anyone who played, or continues to play, Supreme King Z-ARC
strategies. What might be a little less obvious is Darkwurm's viability in
Pendulum Magicians when you're not playing the full set-up to Summon Z-ARC.

Discarding Darkwurm for Pendulum Call, Dragonpit Magician, Dragonpulse
Magician, or even a generic card like Twin Twisters instantly sets up a
Special Summon and a search for Supreme King Gate. Darkwurm reclaims a huge
amount of card advantage from discard effects, and that's crucial for
Pendulum strategies when their set-ups require so many extra cards. The
same can be said for Xyz Summons. Timestar Magician's one of the few ways
Pendulum Magicians can avoid quickly losing card advantage while Xyz
Summoning, but now Darkwurm is another option. Making generic Xyz with
Darkwurm loads at least one card into the graveyard for a recovery play
down the road.

Pendulum Magicians are loaded with Level 4 Dark Monsters, so Allure of
Darkness can be a decent fit. Typically it's not played, but the Supreme
King engine makes the draw spell so much better. Searching Supreme King
Gates gives you at least one potentially excess Dark monster, and much like
Genex Controller those Gates are excellent for Allure of Darkness. Rather
than just a free search, Darkwurm's effect can also let you dig deeper into
the deck and reach your unsearchable tech choices even faster.

There's only one relevant Normal Summon in Pendulum Magicians: Performapal
Skullcrobat Joker. Darkwurm's a solid Normal Summon despite activating just
as easily through a Special Summon. If you need a low Scale to start
Pendulum Summoning at all you can simply Normal Summon Darkwurm.
Alternatively, Darkwurm can be activated in the Pendulum Zone to search a
Supreme King Gate Zero. Since most of your monsters are Dark anyways
there's often no drawback to doing so.

2 DARK Pendulum Monsters
Must be either Fusion Summoned, or Special Summoned by Tributing the above cards you control (in which case you do not use "Polymerization"). Once per turn: You can target 1 other monster on the field or in the GY; until the End Phase, this card's name becomes that monster's original name, and replace this effect with that monster's original effects, also for the rest of this turn, if your monster attacks a Defense Position monster, inflict piercing battle damage to your opponent.

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If you do choose to go all-out with Supreme Gates you can still Pendulum
Summon them the 8-to-1 Pendulum Scale that's common in Magician Pendulums.
There's rarely enough space to do so from the Extra Deck, but Pendulum
Summoning from the hand works great. Darkwurm and a Gate puts you two
monsters closer to a Link-3, or you can trade them out for a Supreme King
Dragon Starving Venom. With two Gates you'll have access to a Rank 7 Xyz.

Each of the Gates has their own monster effect that Special Summons a copy
of certain Dragon monsters from the Extra Deck. While the effect itself
isn't terribly useful if you're not trying to Summon Supreme King Z-ARC,
you can still use it to trigger the effects of Iris Magician, Black Fang
Magician, and Purple Poison Magician. Immediately afterwards you can put
that Supreme King Gate into your Pendulum Zone, so you effectively break
even on the effect. Star Pendulumgraph turns that trade into a +1 overall.
The monster Summoned with the Gate effect can't be used for Synchro or Xyz
Summons, but it can be used for Fusion, Ritual, Tribute, and Link Summons.

You can go a step further and play a Foolish Burial or Dragon Shrine to
send Darkwurm to the graveyard immediately. Master Pendulum, the
Dracoslayer can be sent with Dragon Shrine before Darkwurm to load up an
extra monster and future target for Dinoster Power, the Mighty Dracoslayer.
That's only relevant if you're playing another Dracoslayer Pendulum
Monster, of course. Opening with a way to send Darkwurm to the graveyard is
surprisingly solid. You can net a free Summon, search, and set yourself up
for a quick Xyz or Fusion Summon before your Pendulum Summon. At worst
you'll be hit with a Dimensional Barrier, but one of the best outcomes is
seeing a Solemn Strike land on your Darkwurm before you Pendulum Summon.
It's excellent bait for those dangerous backrows.

I don't think Darkwurm will be saving Pendulums, but it's definitely worth
checking out. OCG builds are already including it in their
newly-revitalized Pendulum Magicians, and I think any comeback by Pendulums
will almost certainly include Darkwurm. If nothing else it's been
tremendously fun to play, especially with the new Supreme King Dragon cards
in Code of the Duelist.

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